Help coming up with patterns in racial names

[Swordfry]

I have several different races in my own world, but I am having trouble making each race's language and set of names similar. I mean one human like race I have includes several common names like Isaac and several others found today. But at the same time, there are other members of this race with very fantastic, alien like names. They just do not seem to blend at all, like the one race would never come up with both of those names. Am I making sense?

What are some name patterns I could use to make each of my races feel more homogeneous?

 

[evolution_rex]

Maybe the more alien-like names are older and used mostly in the rural and conservative areas the race dwells and the well known English or modern names are used for those in the larger cities who are a bit more liberal. Or perhaps the alien-like names are after ancient gods are royalty, or have been borrowed after the mixing of another culture and/or race in history.

Really though, for simplicity's sake, if the natural language of your race doesn't seem like it would create the name 'Isaac' then you shouldn't name someone of that race 'Isaac'. Personally it would break my immersion when reading (unless it has a specific explanation, like the ones I suggested). Assuming you've made a language or your making a language, make names that fit naturally with the language. You wouldn't have a language that's based on Japanese for people who are named James Wellington, you know? (However, if you explained, let's say, that James changed his name so Americans wouldn't get angry at him when he's working as a costumer service provider, then it would all be fine). If you don't have a language in mind for your races and don't plan on making one, come up with at least a basic jist of what their language would sound like, typically by comparing that race to real life races. Maybe you want your Orcs to be based off of oriental languages, so you can find Chinese/Japanese/Vietnamese/etc names for your Orc character.

 

[The_Murky_Night]

1. If your races have names based on a made up language, but you don't feel like making a language, decide what you know the language would at least sound like. Make up of few name endings ( -a meaning feminine and -o meaning masculine, for example) and then just come up names that sound right to you. Just create a loose set of rules to apply to names.

2. If the names are reminiscent of a real world culture, stick to that culture. It would be odd to have an Aurelius marrying a Parvati or a Leonardo naming his son Haakon.

Of course, you can have long, more complex, more fantastical names with alongside normal sounding names like Isaac. The key is to provide an explanation- perhaps there were once two ethno-linguistic groups that, through one reason or another, mixed and mingled and thus you see names of two cultures. However, that would imply this race is not part of a homogenous society.

 

[valiant12]

my suggestions-
1 Use the really exotic names for people that recently immigrated to the land and still using their traditional names instead of the local traditional names.
2 use exotic names in only one region of the world. Humans from different part of our real world have different names.
3 don't use weird names for your humans. keep the alien names for more alien races.

 

[MineOwnKing]

You could spice up the common names so that they are not so jarring.

Maybe take a mix of Scandinavian and Japanese?

Sven--(Scandinavian)

Takahari--(Japanese)

Sventaka

 

[Russ]

In such endevours there is no substitute for some basic knowledge of linguistics, culture and etymology.

It is hard work, but will really pay off for you.

 

[Feo Takahari]

If I may give a personal example, I had one setting where I needed a strong contrast between names. For one group, I used long, flowing names with a lot of vowels, like Amanea and Grasiela. For the other, I used short , harsh names like Royce and Sam. This also allowed for some adaptation between languages, like a traitor who changes his name from Tomasio to Tom, and a mixed-race youth who goes by Marie but admits her real name is Maralia.

 

[X Equestris]

If your culture resembles a real world one, using names from that culture as a starting point is a good move. You can then change them a little if you don't want them to be actual, real world names.